06-Aug, Semis:Top seeds through to finals
The top two seeds in both the Men’s and Women’s events at the
2016 Victorian Open Squash Championships will meet in the finals
at the Mulgrave Country Club.

In the Men’s event, English top seed Joe Lee will meet hometown
hero and number two seed Rex Hedrick in the tournament play-off
after both recorded straight-game victories in their respective
semi-final matches.

World number 52 Lee assumed control of the contest early and
never let go of the ascendancy in his match up with Indian
number three seed Harinder Pal Singh Sandhu.

Lee’s 11/8, 11/4, 12/10 victory in 59 minutes means he will take
on local Westerfolds Squash Club player Hedrick, who defeated
eighth seed Indian Kush Kumar, 11/5, 11/7, 11/5.

Hedrick, the world number 57, will head into the final with a
swell of hometown support and confident of success having
defeated Lee in last week’s Kooyong International.

In the Women’s semi-finals, number one seed Dipika Pallikal was
able to achieve what her male Indian compatriots could not by
reaching the play-off match for the 2016 Victorian Open title.

Pallikal was a dominant force in her semi-final match up with
Nouran El Torky, defeating the Egyptian inside 24 minutes, 11/4,
11/4, 11/2.

She will now face tournament second seed Millie Tomlinson, who
along with Lee in the Men’s ensured England had a representative
in each of the PSA events at the Victorian Open.

In a tight struggle, Tomlinson defeated Egyptian sixth seed
Mayar Hany in four, 11/3, 12/10, 3/11, 9/11, 11/7, and will now
be aiming to win her sixth PSA World Tour title for the year.

05-Aug, Quarters:Hedrick flies the flag in Melbourne
Rex Hedrick has continued to fly the flag as the only Australian
left in the Victorian Open main draw after he moved through to
the Men’s event semi-final stage on Friday night.

The local Westerfolds Squash Club player and number two seed had
a slow start against Welshman Joel Makin losing the first game
3-11, but eventually found his touch to take out the next three
games in a tight struggle, 14-12, 11-3, 11-3.

Kumar looked to be on his way out of the tournament after a
strong start from Peter saw him lose the first two games, but
the world number 102 fought back in courageous fashion,
eventually taking it 10-12, 5-11, 11-3, 11-4, 11-6.

Fellow Indian Harinder Pal Singh Sandhu will join Kumar in the
semi-final stage after he got the better of New Zealand’s Evan
Williams in four.

Much like his countryman, Sandhu was forced to come from behind
after losing the first, but was able to overcome the plucky Kiwi
in four, 9/11, 11/2, 11/2, 11/7.

Sandhu will now face tournament number one seed Joe Lee, who
unlike his fellow semi-finalists had a reasonably straight
forward three-game victory over Irishman Arthur Gaskin.

For a full list of results and upcoming fixtures in the Men's
PSA M10 tournament, click here.

In the Women’s event, top seed Dipika Pallikal was made to work
hard to gain her ticket to the semi-final against New Zealand’s
Megan Craig.

Craig made a promising start to the contest by taking out the
first game, forcing the Indian world number 19 to dig deep.

Eventually Pallikal assumed control of the match and progressed
with a 7/11, 11/6, 11/4, 11/8 victory.

She will now face the only unseeded player left in the draw,
Nouran El Torky, after she defeated Japan’s Misaki Kobayashi.

The Egyptian got the jump on her more fancied opponent by taking
out the first two games, before number five seed Kobayashi
responded to win the third.

But it was El Torky who kept her nerve in the fourth to secure
her spot in the final four, 11/5, 11/6, 7/11, 11/9.

The other Women’s semi-final match up will see El Torky’s
compatriot Mayar Hany come up against English number two seed
Millie Tomlinson.

Hany caused somewhat of an upset by toppling fourth seed
Belgian, Nele Gilis, with the sixth seed recovering from being
1-0 down to win 8/11, 11/9, 11/6, 11/9.

Tomlinson on the other hand was clinical in her dismissal of
South African Siyoli Waters, securing her passage through to the
next stage with a straight-game victory, 11/8, 11/6, 11/4.

04-Aug:All but one seed through to quarters
The quarter-final draw of both the Men’s and Women’s sections of
the 2016 Victorian Open was decided, with a predominately
international field featuring in both competitions.

At the conclusion of Day 3, eight different nationalities still
remain in the Men’s competition, while seven different
nationalities make up the quarter-final places in the Women’s
event.

The second round of the Men’s competition left little to the
imagination, as seven of the eight matches in play resulted in
straight-sets victories.

Third seed Harinder Pal Singh Sandhu managed to fight off plucky
Kiwi Lance Beddoes, who despite claiming the third game could
not continue the momentum, eventually going down 11-7, 11-8,
5-11, 11-6.

Victorian Rex Hendrick justified his second seeding in the
competition wiping Kiwi Luke Jones off the court to progress
with an 11-5, 11-1, 11-4 win.

Evan Williams continued on with the great form that saw him take
out last week's Bendigo International Open, making light work of
French opponent Vincent Droesbeke, 11-6, 11-6, 11-4.

Australian duo Rhys Dowling and Thomas Calvert could not
continue the form that saw them reach the second round of
competition – going out at the hands of Reiko Peter and Arthur
Gaskin respectively.

In the Women’s competition, seven of the eight seeds made it
through to the quarters, with third-seeded Victorian Christine
Nunn knocked out after losing to Egyptian Nouran El Torky, 11-6,
11-7, 11-8.

It was a comfortable win for El Torky, who will now face
Japanese fifth seed Misaki Kobayashi in the round of eight.

Kobayashi made it through after a marathon fight against one of
Victoria’s other great hopes, Sarah Caldwell, and after a torrid
and tense battle scraped home with an 11-5, 14-16, 8-11, 11-5,
12-10 win.

One of the highlights of the opening women’s main-draw round was
the straight-sets victory to Brit Millie Tomlinson, beating Hana
Ramadan 11-5, 11-6, 11-2, Tomlinson avenging her defeat at the
hands of Ramadan in last week's Bendigo International.

Despite beating Tomlinson on her way to claiming 2016 Bendigo
International Open last week, Ramadan was simply no match for
the second seed this time around, who clearly had revenge on her
mind heading into this event.

03-Aug:Top Men’s seeds through,
Women’s qualifying complete on Day Two
The top eight seeds in the 2016 Victorian Open Squash
Championships all made it through to the second round of the
men's at the Mulgrave Country Club on Wednesday night.

Top seed Joe Lee, main local hope and number two seed Rex
Hedrick, Harinder Pal Singh Sandhu, Reiko Peter, Joel Makin,
Arthur Gaskin, Evan Williams and Kush Kumar all won their
opening round matches on Day 2 and will continue their campaigns
in the next round on Thursday evening.

Day 2 action also saw the qualifiers from Day 1 enter the main
draw, with Vincent Droesbeke, Indian Sandeep Ramachandran and
Luke Jones all progressing to the second round.

The news wasn’t so good for the other qualifiers from the
opening day in Jong Myoung Park, Vivian Rhamanan, Syed Azlan
Amjad, Connor Sheen and local Mulgrave Country Club player
Darren Chan, who went down in their respective matches.

Other local Victorian players bundled out from the main draw on
Wednesday night included Melbourne University’s David Clegg and
Westerfolds’ Jason Holmes, leaving Hedrick as the sole Victorian
male left in the tournament.

Hedrick does however have an unseeded Australian duo
accompanying him in the second round, with Queensland’s Thomas
Calvert and Northern Territory’s Rhys Dowling still in the draw.

A full list of opening round results and second round fixtures
from the PSA M10 tournament can be found here.

Day 2 of the Victorian Open also saw qualifying for the Women’s
tournament wrap up, with Teh Min Jie, Rachel Arnold, Danielle
Letourneau and Hana Ramadan all booking their places in the main
draw.

From an Australian point of view, the wins of Min Jie, Arnold
and Ramadan unfortunately came at the expense of Lakeesha Rarere,
Samantha Calvert and Stephanie Wighton respectively.

Australia will instead be represented in the main Women’s draw
by Victorian contenders Christine Nunn (third seed) and Sarah
Cardwell, while New South Wales’ Tamika Saxby will also begin
her tournament in the main draw.

02-Aug, Qualifying:Former world champ returns
to the court on Day OneThe return of former world champion
Rodney Martin to a PSA World Tour event was the highlight of
the opening day at the 2016 Victorian Open.

Kicking
off at the Mulgrave Country Club on Tuesday night, the attention
of many of the observers in attendance was focused on
50-year-old Martin, who took on New Zealand’s Luke Jones
in the hope of qualifying for the main draw of the Men’s Open.

19-year-old Jones, who was still five years off being born when
Martin famously won the 1991 World Open, showed he wasn’t
daunted by his well-credentialed opponent by taking out the
first game.

Knowing he needed to lift to stay in the contest, Martin
thrilled onlookers by showing glimpses of his brilliant best to
snatch the second.

But belying the experience gap between the two, it was Jones who
held his nerve to secure a 11-8, 9-11, 11-5, 11-9 victory, and
in the process ensured Martin’s first on-court appearance at a
PSA event in 22 years was short-lived.

In the first round of Women’s qualifying, Egypt’s Hana
Ramadan continued on with the form that saw her win the
Bendigo International Open title on the weekend by defeating
young Victorian Taylor Flavell, 11-2, 11-5, 11-4.

On a better note for Australians seeking a spot in the main
draw, Stephanie Wighton, Samantha Calvert and
Lakeesha Rarere all made it through to the second round of
Women’s qualifying.

Also joining them in the next qualifying round will be Malaysian
duo Teh Min Jie and Rachel Arnold, Canada’s
Danielle Letourneau and India’s Sachika Ingale.

01-Aug, Preview:
Local hope Hedrick ready to perform
at Victorian Open
Top ranked Victorian Rex Hedrick will enter this week’s
Victorian Open at Mulgrave Country Club full of confidence.

The 27-year-old warmed up for the state’s most prestigious
squash tournament by taking out the Kooyong International over
the weekend, and prior to that won the Malaysian Squash Tour III
event in April before finishing runner-up in the New Zealand
International in June.

Ever the tough self-marker, Hedrick said there were still
elements of his game that had required improvement in the past
few months, but was confident he was ready to perform at his
peak this week.

“There’s been a few mixed results; I’ve been reasonably happy
with my form but I lost a couple of matches to Paul Coll over in
New Zealand," Hedrick said.

"Whenever you are losing a couple matches in a row, you’re
always reviewing what you’re doing wrong and how you can improve
on that for the next tournament coming up, which is the Vic
Open.

“I’ve been back to the drawing board a little bit, but I’m
confident I can play some good squash during the tournament.”

Coming into this year’s Victorian Open as the number two seed in
the Men's draw, Hedrick said he had a point to prove after being
hampered by injury during his second round exit in 2015.

“It was a pretty disappointing result at the Vic Open last
year for myself,” Hedrick said.

"I was struggling a little bit with injury with my hamstrings at
the time, but they have come good now so I’m hoping to do a lot
better than last time.”

While the world number 57 says playing in a major tournament in
his home state ‘will definitely be a benefit’, he doesn’t expect
it will bring an overbearing expectation to perform.

“I don’t think it is too much added pressure, you sort of just
see it as another pro tournament,” Hedrick said.

“You’re there to compete and do your best, and obviously being
on home soil means you’ll have some more support and maybe a
little bit of added pressure because you know so many people
watching.

“You are obviously most comfortable at home, but sometimes you
can fall into the trap of being a little too comfortable, so you
need to make sure you are still preparing fine and doing the
things that you are normally doing at a tournament, because when
you are away your sole focus is just to compete.

“At the end of the day, once the tournament starts it will just
feel like another tournament I believe."

And with the 2016 Australian Open immediately succeeding the
Victorian Open, Hedrick says he can’t wait for the opportunity
to again compete in major tournaments in his backyard.

“At the start of the year when you are mapping out what
tournaments you’ll play, you lock the Victorian and Australian
Opens in straight away because they are a couple of events that
you know you’re keen to play in and will play in,” Hedrick said.

“Even though you’re playing other tournaments, you have got it
in the back of your head that you have to be preparing for these
as well because they will be coming up and you’re locked into
them from very early on."

The 2016 Victorian Open will be held at the Mulgrave
Country Club from August 2-7, with qualifying matches for both
the Men's and Women's Opens beginning tomorrow night.